Violent Parents Might Not Seek Help, Lawyer Warns

Chilling Effect Feared From Arrest

Chilling Effect Feared From Abuse Arrest

NEW BRITAIN — C If it means ending up in jail, violent parents may not call the state for counseling when they most need it, the head of the Connecticut Civil Liberties Union said Tuesday.

Martha Stone, the legal director for the civil liberties union, worried about parents' reactions to the arrest of Nilda I. Negron this week on charges of third-degree assault and risk of injury to a minor.

Police arrested the 34-year-old mother after she called the state Department of Children and Youth Services' hot line Sunday, pleading for help. Negron called the Care Line after whipping two of her children with a belt.

The agency, concerned that the children were in danger, called police.

Last year, the hot line handled 25,000 calls, of which 213 were referred to police, a spokesman for the state children's agency said. In those referrals, no arrests were made, he said.

Nevertheless, "This case is really disturbing," Stone said, the lead attorney in a class-action lawsuit filed against the agency. The suit has already prompted a court order in January requiring the department to make extensive changes in responding to clients.

"I'm most concerned about the chilling effect that this [incident] could have: Will parents be willing to call for help if the only response is punitive?" Stone asked.

But Nilda Negron will get help, said Thomas M. Moriarty, a children's agency spokesman.

"Obviously it's going to be very hard for her to trust us," Moriarty said. "But we'll work through that." The agency will send a counselor and offer her child-guidance programs, such as ones offered at the Klingberg Family Centers in New Britain, he said.

"I feel bad it played out this way," Moriarty said. "But adults have to take responsibilities for their own actions. If she had acted differently, it would have turned out differently." A state panel created as a result of the lawsuit is reviewing what hot line workers should say and do when they receive desperate calls such as

Negron's.

"We will spell out each and every detail of how to implement the hot line," said Judge Robert C. Zampano, a member of the panel monitoring the court decree. The panel is only beginning to write 15 in-depth manuals on specific areas under the responsibility of the children's agency.

For now, the hot line workers will have to use their instincts.

In Negron's case, she picked up the phone to try to keep herself from inflicting the kind of beatings and torment she faced as a child, she said. She was hoping the agency would send a counselor to her housing project to talk with her family.

While Moriarty acknowledged it is unusual for a mother to be arrested when calling the state hot line for help, state family violence laws have pushed police to arrest family members when there is abuse in the home.

It would be speculation to try to figure out why a counselor never went to Negron's home, Moriarty said. "It really is a tough decision. The worker had to make a judgment; if you're going to err, let it be on the side of safety." It is unusual that the agency calls only police, he said; often a counselor and police go to the home.

While Negron was taken to jail, the children were left in the home under the care of Negron's 17-year-old daughter. The children were not hospitalized.

Stone believes the state agency should have taken greater care if it was interested in the children's safety: "There should have been an investigation to protect those children." The 24-hour Care Line number is 1-800-842-2288.